Reflections of Arturo Wolldenschanz
—Liner notes from Planet Gift
Arturo Wolldenschanz, the brilliant German-born pianist and composer of such critically acclaimed works as Four Poster Bed, Pleasing the Moon, and Honey Bath, is a true master of Adult Contemporary music and a prodigious talent who serves his diverse audience extremely well. His solo works and collaborations stand as the mark by which others must be measured. As famed American musicologist and author John Herbert Renfro has said, “Arturo Wolldenschanz is a cultural touchstone, one of those rare individuals who reflects his audience’s taste, and not otherwise. He has a genuine and abiding belief in the universality of life.”
As a youth studying at the Conservatory de Francesco in Venice, Wolldenschanz came under the tutelage of Vasco Q’Enferasi, arguably the father of the twelve-tone, or unterrach theory. It was with Q’Enferasi that Wolldenschanz realized that it is to the lower bass note textures of music that human beings respond most intuitively and interactively. Says Wolldenschanz, “It is there that the hidden thoughts are collected, waiting until that twelfth tone sounds again, so that beauty may blossom, and the truest note be heard.”
In other words, music as tool for personal growth.
After the Conservatory, Wolldenschanz returned to Germany, founding a series of projects designed to “liberate expression from the constraints imposed by the conscious mind.” Emphasizing the use of meticulously crafted wooden instruments as the most naturally resonating corridor between Twentieth Century life and the planet Earth seemingly left behind, the results were nothing short of spectacular. The Gaia Cycle left European audiences breathless with its stunningly evocative tonal representations of lost worlds and new promise.
It is in only the last few years that British audiences have had the opportunity to appreciate the Wolldenschanz genius. This release of Planet Gift represents the pinnacle of a dream to create sound that evokes the heartbeat of the Global Village, in all its joy and promise for a world that truly, in the master’s own words, “…has a place for every person, has a reason to keep giving, and has the gift that is living.”
—Gilberto Bandenwein, Hamlin Fernuniversität die Musikhochschule
